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Revealed: the unstoppable rise of the LCD TV

Explosive growth unhindered by plasma, OLED

LCD technology dominates the TV market, and its grip will only tighten during the next three or four years, market watcher DisplaySearch has said.

That the technology is squeezing out old-style CRT screens won't surprise anyone, but it may come as a disappointment for plasma fans and those of you keen on emerging technology OLED.

Plasma will experience growth this year after starting to decline in 2009, DisplaySearch said, thanks to the introduction of 3D sets. But while sales of plasma TVs will rise to 15m units worldwide in 2010, the will dip again in 2011 and stay essentially static through 2013.

OLED barely registers, appearing on DisplaySearch's marketshare chart as the thinnest of blips in 2012, the point at which vendors like LG and Samsung release reasonable-sized OLED TVs and the ultra-wealthy give them a try.

Source: DisplaySearch

Come 2013, and OLED's annual shipments fall to an invisible line above the 250m-odd TVs sold that are based on other technologies. Even CRT sales will be higher.

But the vast majority will be LCDs, and most of those will be LED-backlit models. This year, some 228m TVs will be sold, of which 180m will be LCDs, DisplaySearch estimates. That's 79 per cent of the market.

In 2013, around 228m LCDs will be sold, 91 per cent of the total. And 139m of them - 55.6 per cent of total telly sales - will have LED backlights. The remainder will have fluorescent backlights. ®